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Comment: Water damage on the bottom edge of the last half of the pages or so. Solid copy with some cover, edge, or corner wear. Worldwide shipping is available.

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Unenthused by a white wedding gown and bored by the hoopla of the Hollywood-style reception, Ariel Meadow Stallings found herself absolutely exhausted with the nuances of traditional nuptials . . . so she chose to take a walk off the beaten aisle. In this updated edition of Offbeat Bride, Stallings humorously recounts the story of the original offbeat weddinghersand shares anecdotes and advice from dozens of other nontraditional couples. She also includes a chapter on budget weddings in today's weak economy, along with sidebars, tips, tricks, and planner encouragement to help you figure out your special day. What results is a combination of hilarious wedding stories and tons of helpful how-tosa perfect mash-up of memoir and handbook.

At once practical and enjoyable, Offbeat Bride validates choosing the funky, different, and offbeat over the traditional, and leads couples through the planning processfrom unique ideas on how to announce their engagement all the way to answering the question, So, how’s married life?” Stallings is the ultimate guide to the alternative wedding of your dreams, and with Offbeat Bride, she brings you a book that serves both as an encouragement and celebration of aisles less traveled.

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This book is fantastic for the bride-to-be who feels that her voice and her vision are being drowned and subverted by family, friends, media, and/or the wedding industrial complex. I started my wedding planning on [...] and found myself thinking that I would never be able to afford a wedding on my budget and that even if I did, I'd probably be so exhausted from the planning and other crap that I didn't want to do that it wouldn't be as much fun as I had imagined. I made the mistake of letting myself be told what my wedding should be. In truth, my wedding can be whatever I (and my fiance!) want it to be and this is what Stallings forcefully reminds us about in her book.

While I do not identify with the specific style of the author, she does wonders in terms of bringing the reader down from the clouds filled with escort cards, aisle runners, and rose-filled bouquets and uses examples from her own, unusual wedding to help the reader choose her own adventure. She encourages and empowers the reader to think critically about what is and is not important to her and to plan her wedding accordingly. Her writing style is conversational and highly amusing- the perfect cocktail for soothing the bridal beast stirring inside. Stallings also offers a myriad of helpful hints about conflict mediation, effective communication, and how to handle the rollercoaster of emotions that accompany getting married. This book is really the comprehensive guide to not losing your sanity over a wedding and promotes an overall mental and emotional approach to getting married that will (hopefully!) maximize your and your fiance's enjoyment of your day (and isn't that really what it's all about?!).

Having showered the author with praise, I think it is important to note here that this book is absolutely not for the bride-to-be who has it all figured out, the bride-to-be who won't be deviating from the predetermined wedding path, or the bride-to-be who already has an impartial cheerleader in her life shouting encouraging mantras from the periphery of her everyday life (if such a woman exists). Every other bride should read this book before she even begins serious planning.

As a side note, Stallings also operates a website with the same name as the book, which is phenomenal. It complements her book nicely in that it offers real examples of how brides made their weddings their own. It also hosts a web community for support and sharing ideas and inspiration. I hate to plug addition "products," but I was so impressed that I couldn't help myself.

In short, if you're feeling lost in the proverbial sauce, buy this book and read it over a nice, soothing cup of whatever. You'll feel right as rain and ready to plan!

I was disappointed with this book, considering how much I like the blog of the same name. It spends too much time talking about the author's wedding specifically, and doesn't contain enough broad advice that can apply to lots of people. It also feels a bit disorganized, sometimes talking about really broad ideas and then suddenly jumping down to the most granular, specific details with little middle ground. Finally, I feel like instead of acting like all approaches to planning a wedding are valid, it sometimes comes off like if you're not having a super unique special-snowflake wedding you're not as good as people who are. I'm not about that attitude. There are much better resources out there -- including the Offbeat Bride website itself -- for people planning unique weddings.

I never thought I would ever get married. That said, it's amazing how meeting the right person can completely change your perspective on EVERYTHING. He popped the question, I said yes. Now we plan a wedding? I don't know where to start! A friend linked me to offbeatbride.com and I felt like I found a refuge from cheese and schmaltz. These are girls like me having every kind of wedding you can imagine! It made me feel like we can DO THIS! Naturally, I ordered the book that launched the website and I devoured it. Ariel writes her own wedding story with copious amounts of humor and honesty and practicality. She tells you like it is and is encouraging and supportive in your vision of a non-traditional wedding. I loved all the tips and advice and I know I will return to this book again and again over the process of planning our wedding. I took off one star because, come on! You wrote an entire book about your gorgeous offbeat wedding and didn't include any pictures??? I feel ROBBED.

This was purchased as a gift for a friend that I thought would love to read and get ideas for an untraditional bride. I think I jumped the gun on this purchase. It wasn't really a handbook or guide the way I thought it was going to be. It was a mediocre story with a couple ideas, but I don't necessarily feel it was what I was hoping for.

When I stumbled upon this book I was in the throes of wedding planning and feeling all kinds of pressure that I was completely unprepared for. All I wanted was a wedding that didn't look or feel like the thousands of cookie cutter weddings that we all read about in magazines, on blogs and that we attend as our friends try to create the "perfect" wedding. This book came to me at a low point. I was doubting whether I could do the wedding I envisioned. Suddenly everyone and their mother had an opinion about something! It was exhausting and I was at the end of my rope.

Once I had this book in my hands I devoured it. I loved every word in it and while what I wanted wasn't too offbeat, it gave me a source of support and inspiration. I loved the part on name changing since that's something I struggled with alot and ultimately decided not to do. It felt good to know there were others out there who didn't just want to go with the status quo. Additionally, finding this book opened up the channels to the wonderful blogs that the author has spun off from Offbeat Bride. Now there's an Offbeat blog for every phase of your Offbeat life! I love it and I cannot express how much Offbeat Bride helped at one of the most important time of my life.

If you don't want the cookie cutter or if you find people are giving you strange looks while planning your wedding, get this book. It'll help. I promise.